In the Dark
by Namek Kaia
Summary: Alternate chapter. Rated for adult situations and language. Drinking. Dancing. And everything else that goes with the biggest party of the century at the Naughty Ottsel. Keira tricks Torn into dancing with her. Read to find out what the night brings.


**In the Dark**

By JakAndTornSweetheart

Disclaimer: I own no rights to the Jak and Daxter Trilogy, its characters, or its storyline. I'm merely borrowing them for my own personal pleasure. ;-)

Author's Note -

This is as close as I think I'll ever get to a songfic. The song is "I Like the Way" by Darren Hayes from his new album, _The Tension and the Spark_. (Go listen to it… it's awesome!) Just to warn you, the events that are spoken about throughout this one-shot are events that will happen in "In the Shadows," the sequel to "Darker by the Day." So you probably won't understand everything like you should, but I tried to write it in a way where I didn't completely leave you in the dark. (pun not intended)

**On an additional note, because things are happening during the playing of the song, note that the actions correspond to the verse that precedes them.**

* * *

The Naughty Ottsel, despite the force of many changes and the temporary over-taking by the Freedom League during the fight against Cyber Errol, was still the only place to go for a good party. Daxter, with help from his friend, Ashelin, the governess of Haven City, had funded the expansion of the tiny hangout due to the massive number of celebrations that spawned from Errol's defeat. The plans had been quickly put into action after the hysteria that accompanied the first attempted Non-Stop House Party. Nearly everyone in Haven and at least half of Spargus packed into the tiny, one-room bar until it wasn't possible for anyone else to enter, and then they had filled the street outside where they could still hear the music.

A limit and a price (unless you were a personal friend of the owner) had been put on admittance to the monthly house parties, held on the last Saturday of every month, until the construction could be finished. Daxter had used the money left over to double his inventory and repair the Ottsel sign over the entrance. He never did get over it being "vandalized".

Tonight would be the first Saturday night house party after the remodeling had been finished, and Daxter was pulling out all the stops and making the event one to remember. The music wasn't stopping until well after dawn, admission was free, and drinks were being sold at a discount. The anticipation surrounding the party was far beyond excitement or anything else that would have made a pitiful excuse to describe it. Other businesses were using the opportunity to milk their merchandise, holding special sells on clothing typically worn on the club scene as well as fashion jewelry, especially anything that glowed in the dark or would stand out under a black light. Oh yes; the excitement was more like frenzy.

And no one more excited about this night that Keira Hagai, the most closeted party girl in Haven City.

To see her in her customized Freedom League uniform, skillfully wielding her gun to take out anything in her way on the battlefield, and then to see her on the dance floor of the Naughty Ottsel, no one would know they were one in the same. Even her friends had a hard time believing how much she let loose when the booze was flowing and the music was pumping. And tonight would be no exception.

"Stop at the next corner if you will," she leaned forward and told the taxi. Taxis were fairly new in Haven, furnished just after Errol's defeat when the rebuilding of Haven City had begun once again, and the only way to travel if you knew you would be too trashed to drive later. Such was the wisdom of the young, beautiful mechanic-slash-soldier. Keira only went to Daxter's hangout for business except for one night a month, reserving that as her only night off-duty. Just because the war with Praxis was over and Errol had been smashed into the ground again didn't mean there wasn't work to be done. But the one night she allowed herself to relax and have fun, there were no limits to what she would do… within sensible reason of course.

"Are you sure, Miss Hagai? I can drive you all the way to the door if you'd like," the taxi responded as he entered South Town and made a right onto the path. Even with the buildings blocking her sight of the club, she could see the search lights streaming through the sky, and it could have been her imagination, but it seemed she could already feel the bass of the music and it rushed through the bar. And without seeing around the corner ahead of them, she knew that the nook was packed with zoomers in line to drop off passengers or be taken by the valets. It would be much quicker to walk, even though her position as Second Commander made her ride free of fare.

"No thank you. I think I'd rather walk from here," she said and felt the zoomer begin to slow. He changed hover zones and came to a stop just past the familiar entrance to the gun course. She thanked him for the ride, stepped out, and began walking toward the entrance of the Naughty Ottsel. As she rounded the last corner, the scene was just as she expected it to be. Zoomers hovered over her head in line and she couldn't even see the end of the line that was at the door. All along the street there were street venders selling cheap necklaces, bracelets, and seemingly anything else that contained the same little flashing lights as the trinkets in the stores. She only encountered two on her short walk to the door, and easily brushed them off. Her eyes were fixed on the large man at the door who was checking bags and Ids, and she flashed him her best smile when his gaze came her way. "Bruno! Are you keeping them in line tonight? Haven't had any problems, have you?" she shouted as she approached. Even outside, the music was so loud that you had to yell to hear yourself.

"Not yet, ma'am. Just a few punks trying to use fake Ids so they can drink. Kids… they're so uninventive these day," he joked and allowed the couple in front of him entrance. "Go on in, Miss Hagai. And see what you can do about that DJ, will ya? Ace couldn't make it last minute and I don't think this new guy knows what he's doing." They both had a good laugh about that and she touched his arm as she passed and gave him a knowing smirk.

"You know how I am about the music, Bruno."

"I know," he replied. "That's why I specifically asked you. I don't know if it's because you're the only one who requests music from the DJ or because no one else has any taste, but the music is only good when you're here."

"I know," she quipped. The door slid open for her and she shrugged off her jacket as she slipped inside. As the door slid back closed, she could hear the collective groan from those in line because she had cut in front of them. She heard Bruno yell them into silence before she started for the bar, her small bag and coat in hand.

She had to hand it to Daxter. His designs for the remodeling really had turned out well, hence the large rooms on either side of her where walls once stood. The middle of the entire floor had been replaced with Plexiglas frosted with a white overlay so that they lights that flashed and streamed from below were softened. Soft blue lights trimmed the new flooring, giving the entire place a blue hue to it. Lighting had been added above her too, for strobe lights were set up in the top corners of the room as well as various colored lights that moved this way and that. The DJ's booth, she had noticed, had been moved from the lower left corner of the Ottsel to the far corner of the room to her right. Remembering Bruno's request, she eyed the DJ, and he was indeed new, but seemingly experienced. He wasn't bad… he just didn't play her kind of her music. The VIP room, which used to only be the VIP corner, was ahead of her in the room to her left. She guessed that's where most of her friends were. But she had come here to party, not sit and talk with her friends about stuff like she did every other day.

People crowded the floor and filled most of the booths that still lined the walls of every room, and she weaved her way to the bar where Daxter, along with Tess, was supervising the distribution of the alcohol and ordering drinks for his friends in the VIP room. She supposed that owners didn't usually come to the bar to order drinks, but then again, only few people knew the slang that was tossed around at the bar. She happened to be one of those few.

"Kiera!" Daxter called as he saw her approach. "The party started three hours ago. Where ya been!" His speech was already starting to slur a bit, but he was still pretty sober considering how drunk he _could_ get.

"Yeah," Tess followed. "We've been missing you all night." And then as if dismissing the subject she yelled, "Oh! I love your outfit!"

"Yeah, Keir. Lookin' good, as always," Daxter added.

Keira beamed with pride at their compliments. Her green-ish hair, streaked with bold black highlights had been cut shorter that she had grown used to wearing it. The layers and deliberate uneven ends made it look stylishly messy. Her halter was a deep blue, and the ties at the nape of her neck and at the middle of her back made it look like shirttails draped down her back. Both were made up of the same sleek material that sparkled brilliantly in the moving lights. Her mid-section was bare, displaying the toned muscles of her abdomen, and her hips were hugged by a black miniskirt that also seemed to sparkle underneath the lighting. Her black heels that were sensible enough for dancing had straps that tied up her ankle and reached just below her calf and her earrings at the base of her ear lobe dangled almost to her shoulders.

"Thanks, it's new," she said as if she didn't always look this dazzling on dance nights. "And you guys know that my night doesn't start until 11." She eyed the large clock on the wall behind the bar. It read 12:05. "See? Right on time." With a wink to her two ottsel friends, she stepped behind the bar and placed her things under the counter. Without missing a beat, she grabbed a shot glass and a bottle, poured herself a drink called an Icebreaker, and downed it with no problem.

"So what's your poison tonight, Hagai?" came from the man behind the bar that was setting up a group of shots of his own for an order.

Replacing the bottle and sliding him her glass to him, she half-yelled, "Sliders all night, Cutter. Just put it on my tab." And with that, she headed to the DJ's booth to give him a talking to about what was and was not considered music.

* * *

Three hours later, Torn was on his nth drink of whiskey, which he downed half of in one gulp. Dance parties weren't exactly his kind of scene, but he wasn't here for the dancing… he was here for the booze. And alcohol helped him relax. Then he could think; an amazing feat considering the hundreds of people and the blaring music from the speakers, one of which was just behind his booth. But thinking made him depressed at times, like tonight, and that only made him drink more. It was a vicious cycle that he didn't care to break out of. He sat in his usual booth by the bar, with his head in one hand and his other twirling the short glass of liquor around and around. He sighed, took a breath, gulped the rest of his drink down and slammed the glass on the table in front of him. "Cutter!" he barked at the bartender. "Another whiskey." While he waited, he stared incessantly at the empty seat across from him.

He hadn't seen Keira all night…

In fact, he hadn't seen her at all in the last week. She hadn't been to her room in Freedom HQ either, for his ear seemed trained to hear her approaching footsteps and now all he heard from her close-by room was silence. He didn't fear she was missing, because he knew she was still fighting missions for the Freedom League, just none that included him. What he really feared was that she was avoiding him. Keira was his right hand, and right now he'd felt like it'd severed without his knowledge, or consent. It had been just a stupid misunderstanding, and if he could just explain…

As if the Precursors were reading his mind, Keira emerged from the pulsing crowd of people, glistening gloriously with sweat, and slapped her hand down on the bar. "Slider!" she called and, despite her state, caught the glass that was slid across the bar and emptied it. "Thanks, Cutter."

The average looking blonde man behind the counter nodded and placed a glass of golden liquor on the bar. "You're whiskey, Torn," he called over the music.

Surprised, Keira turned in the direction that Cutter had looked to see Torn's gaze fixed upon her instead of his glass. "Torn! I haven't seen you all night," she started as she took his glass and walked the two steps over to his booth. Ignoring his motion to the other side of the booth, she collapsed in his seat and made him slide over. He slid again, against the wall, to give her more room, but she only slid with him and closed the distance.

Slightly irritated, he said, "You've been avoiding me…"

"I've been busy," she countered and looked away from him.

"I know… so busy that you only eat and sleep between the constant missions you've been giving yourself."

"I've been…"

"You've been avoiding me!" he shouted.

"And for good reason!" she shouted back just as loud. And then after a minute she said in a softer voice, "Can we not do this now? This is my only night off-duty and I'd rather spend it dancing than fighting."

To that, he only gave a simple, "Fine," and took a sip of his drink. When he set down the glass again, Keira allowed herself a sip as well, suddenly needing something stronger than the tens of Sliders she'd been drinking.

"You're wearing the khaki slacks that I bought for you," she observed after a long while of silence. She was trying to make conversation, but all she received was a muffled "Mmm hmm." She bought them, in fact, to match the long-sleeved black shirt he was wearing. She took a while to look him over, realizing just how much she had missed his face after such a long absence of it. Without looking, she knew that he wore his combat boots, and her gaze traveled from his stomach, over his face and to his newly-shortened hair. She hadn't really looked at him much since she'd cut it after half of it had been singed off in the explosion. It suited him in some weird way. He even styled it the way she had that day, the gel lifting it away from his scalp and almost straight up into the air. And even with gel, there were many strands that refused to be styled and they stood out this way and that, looking almost as stylishly disheveled as her own hair.

"How do you like your hair?" she asked, this time in genuine curiosity. He hadn't known what to do with it after he'd recovered from the accident. But she had offered to fix it the best way she knew how given the great deal of hair that had been burnt off. There was no way for him to keep his dreads, and he was none to happy about it. At the time, he hadn't said either way on whether he liked it or not.

"I'm getting used to it," he replied and took another sip of whiskey. He stared at the reflections in the liquid as he added, "You did good, Keira." Her name rolled off his tongue like it was second nature, but he felt something shift in him whenever he said it. He couldn't tell whether the something was good something or a bad something.

Keira felt more awkward by the moment. She hated how their both their tones were monotonous, like they were strangers. She hated how she felt like she couldn't talk to him, even though she never really had been able to before. Taking a deep breath and releasing it, she asked, "Are you angry with me?" She braced herself for the horrible answer she knew would come, then nearly jumped when he immediately said no. "But…"

"You didn't do anything wrong. Why would I be angry?" he replied calmly.

"But…"

"You've been beating yourself up over this for nearly four years, haven't you?" he asked, turning to her for the first time that night. But again, she looked away and their booth fell silent.

Not wanting to travel down the path she'd set them on, she became desperate for a change of subject. Noticing the song that bumped through the room was near its end, it came to her. "Dance with me?"

He grunted. "Hmph. Not likely."

Raising one eyebrow, she started out of the booth. "Alright… but it's your loss." He watched her backside as it swayed with her steps to the dance floor. The music seamlessly changed tempos and the room was filled with a new song. A young man, seeing her approach, pulled her back against his chest and rotated his hips into her, and already prepared, she moved in perfect sync with him. Her gaze met Torn's across the floor and he was staring intensely at her. She smirked and danced shamelessly with the stranger behind her, all the while keeping her eyes locked with Torn's.

He knew that she was purposely teasing him, and worse… it was working. His blood boiled every time the stranger's hands touched her. He pulled her hair to one side and smiled down at her. He held her hips as they moved together to the beat. And now that she'd turn to face him, still keeping her eyes on Torn, he was sliding his hands over her bare back and moving them lower to her…

The stranger yelped out loud as Torn yanked him away from his dancing partner. With a light shove, he released him and warned him to step off with a tone filled with pure acid. Keira smiled and reveled in his obvious display of envy. She realized he would never admit it though, and wasn't at all surprised when he said, "I changed my mind."

"I knew you would," she replied over the softening music and turned to give a sharp whistle at the DJ. The dark-blue-headed man looked up from his equipment to the source of the sound and she waved two fingers in the air when his eyes fell on her. As the man nodded and directed his attention back where it had been, she turned to Torn. "Now… let's see what you've got, Head Commander."

At the sound of the strange-sounding music that was now pumping through the bar, Torn cocked an eyebrow at Keira's grin. "Just give it a second. It gets good." She winked before she put her back to his chest and began moving to the beat as it began to thrum through the speakers. When he didn't move with her, she turned and gave him a puzzled look. "What's wrong? I thought you wanted to dance."

"Ummm… I, ah," he started, still looking at her as if she suddenly had two heads.

Finally understanding, she smiled and leaned into him, her mouth to his ear. "It's like sex… only with your clothes on," she said, and her tone shot jolts of electricity through him. He knew there were different kinds of drunks; the happy drunk, the depressed drunk, the angry drunk, and the incoherent drunk. Personally, Torn saw himself as the calm, collected drunk. Keira, he now understood, was obviously a sexy drunk. Or maybe that's just who she was - a young woman who had arrived in Haven a scared girl from Sandover and had morphed herself into a sex goddess with a bad attitude.

Torn arrived from his thoughts to find that Keira had reached behind her to grab his hips, and was now guiding them along with her movements to the quick, half second beat of the electronic music. Once his hips began to swivel with hers, he realized how easy this dancing thing really was. She was right; it _was_ like sex with your clothes on. Remembering all too well what the other guy had done while dancing with Keira, he relaxed and held her hips to his as they danced. Surprised, Keira looked over her shoulder and saw his smirk. "See? You're a natural!" she yelled over the music and leaned back into him as her hands rested on his thighs for support.

_Somewhere inside my evolution_

_Karmically I seek retribution_

_Looking for love in the physical beauty_

_Desire is the drug of the bourgeoisie_

He felt strange and comfortable at the same time; strange for even being out on the dance floor at all and comfortable because of the amazing woman in front of him… or was it the whiskey? It was hard to tell. Torn couldn't hear her voice, but he could occasionally see her mouth moving as she sang with the masculine voice that filled the bar. Her whole body swayed and moved with the music, and he noticed already that she liked to close her eyes and just let the music move her. And as if knowing he was looking at her, she looked to him, again over her shoulder, and gave a smile at saying the word "bourgeoisie". (said booj-zwah-zee)

_And now I try to intellectualize_

_Like a glimmer of good in a bad man's eyes_

_I am consumed by the flesh haunting me_

_I know temptation taunts the empty_

Suddenly, her hips jolted and swiveled in the opposite direction. Without thinking, his hips moved with hers and he was surprised that he managed to stay in sync with her. He could feel her hands begin to roam over his leg as she began to move more freely. Her head lolled back and forth and her backside pressed further into the cradle of his hips. His grip on her hips tightened and he nearly gasped when she arched her back and rested her head on his chest.

_So pour yourself over me_

_Until there's nothing left to see (yeah, yeah)_

_Because I like the way you move in the dark_

_I like the tension, the tension and the spark_

All of Torn's muscles clenched in unison when Keira slid down his body to almost sit on the floor. Apparently the words of the song had moved her to do more than dance and now she was actually corresponding with the lyrics, pouring her body over his, her arms reaching up and out so she could touch him where she could. He caught her hand, and as she turned, helped her to her feet. He didn't plan on the way she brushed her body against his or the dark, sexy look she had in her eyes. It was playfully erotic, dancing with Keira, and the way she was looking at him tore him up inside. No woman had ever looked at him that way. No other woman had those eyes.

The lights dimmed almost completely, the blue lights under their feet still casting enough light to see. The angle of the light cast enticing shadows on their faces. He could still see her eyes despite the darkness, the way her arms lifted as her fingers tangled in her own hair, and movement of her lips as she sang the lyrics to the song. What exactly was she trying to do to him? Didn't she realize how she looked doing that? The whole ensemble was absolutely… mouth-watering.

_The decadence of giving in to desire_

_Creates such entropy within_

_Looking for love in the spiritual faces_

_Blind to the art of fabrication_

As Keira started to turn away from him, Torn caught her by the waist and brought her body firmly against his. Their hips shifted in sync to the beat of the music, and she could tell that the tug at the corners of his mouth was an attempt to hide his smirk. As one arm fully encircled her waist, she brought her own hands to his shoulders and felt his other hand moving higher along her back. She quickly saw that her simple dance with Torn was going to have to involve more than just the sway of their hips. Slowly, she began to lean more and more of her weight away from him and into his arms. Soon he was supporting her in a slight dip, and her head lolled back with a bright smirk on her face that she had reclaimed the upper hand in their battle of dominance.

_I'm like a baby sucking momma's milk_

_Wanna drink my fill and then some_

_Leave me alone_

_I always thought I was better than this_

_But temptation tempts the temptee _

He quickly pulled her upright and intended to pull her to him again, but she twisted out his grasp and spun sideways, ending up straddling his left leg. Again she bent back in a dip, and as he reached to support her, he couldn't help but notice the way that her skirt rode dangerously high on her thigh or how the low-cut halter allowed the most tempting view of cleavage. He shook the thoughts quickly from his mind. He really should stop thinking about her that way. It had only been six months since Jak had utterly crushed her heart and started dating Ashelin. Never mind the fact that she could never see him the way he saw her, especially after what he had inadvertently done to her. Still, he couldn't help feeling the way he did. He was so lost in his thoughts that he almost forgot to pull her back up.

Keira used the momentum from the pull of his arms to propel herself in another spin. In one fluid motion, she crossed his body, straddled his other leg, and repeated her actions. He pulled her back to him quicker this time, and when she was upright, she put her hand flat against his stomach to push away from him, knowing he wouldn't let her go. But when she saw the emotion in his eyes, emotion that hadn't been there before, she almost couldn't push him away. She wanted nothing more to pull him to her and never let go. With a deep breath, she cleared her head and finally pushed him away. Who was she kidding? After what she did to him, to his family, there was no way he could want anything to do with her. Yet he was dancing so close to her, with that look in his eyes, his hand pressing against her lower back, his hips alternately swaying with hers and against hers. She was so confused. What exactly was he trying to do to her?

_Pour yourself over me_

_Until there's nothing left to see (yeah, yeah)_

_Oh, because I like the way you move in the dark_

_And I like the tension, the tension and the spark_

The thud of Daxter's jaw hitting the floor was overpowered by the pounding music as he laid eyes on what everyone else in the club had gathered around to see. Keria and Torn were… dancing! Together! Wait… Torn was dancing? This was too good to keep to himself. Immediately, he rushed back through hundreds of legs and back to the VIP room. Jak, Ashelin, Sig, Tess, Jinx, and Onin and Pecker all sat in a semicircle around their table of drinks. A speaker in the corner of the room poured forth the music being played in the club. Fingers and boots tapped along with the beat of the music as they talked. All present nearly jumped out of their seats when the door slammed open. Daxter stood with his hand on the door, out of breath with his excitement.

"What is it, Dax? Is the bar out of drinks already?" Jak asked, snaking his arm back around Ashelin's shoulder.

Daxter held up his hands in his usual animated way. "Guys! You will not believe this! You gotta come see!" And with that, he ran back out the door and into the crowd. The company he had left exchanged glances at each other before rising and following out into the club. Only Onin stayed behind, already knowing what had and would transpire.

_Because I like the way you move in the dark_

_You know I like the tension, the tension and, the tension the spark_

Jak and Ashelin were pushing people to the side to make their way through to the front, and broke through the last few people with a hard shove and a solid, simultaneous, "Move!" In the same union fashion, they gasped at what they saw. There in the middle of the parted crowd, with most of the whole club watching, was the Head and Co Commanders of the Freedom League… dancing… together.

"He would never dance with me," Ashelin muttered under her breath for no one to hear and crossed her arms.

Keira and Torn looked as if someone had told them the greatest thing in the world. Both had small smiles tugging at the mouths. Keira was being pulled in from a series of spins, and as she was pulled hard against him, she raised her leg to be caught at his hip and touched the side of his face. Both their hands slowly fell away as their gazes locked and the song passed through a short interlude of notes without lyrics. Their breath fell on the other's face, a sheen of sweat on both their skins, and tempting lips only inches apart. With no way of telling which one of them had moved closer, their lips went from inches to brushstrokes away from each other.

_This physicality_

_Shifting me chemically_

_Such power over me_

_It's just desire_

_I know it's trickery (shifting me chemically)_

_I know it's just skin deep (such power over me)_

_I know I should resist_

Suddenly, with the lyrics of the bridge and the quickened beat pumping through her, she turned away and gave herself up to the music, not knowing that Torn had moved the last distance between them a moment too late. He easily recovered though, and pulled her against him as if his heart had never jumped in his throat just a few moments ago. It was almost hard for him to keep up with her hips. They gyrated to the fast beat as her arms swayed away from her, then back in to tangle in her mass of hair, throwing her head this way and that, lifting the hair off of her neck. She was well aware that his hands roamed her bare skin as the cradle of his hips ground back against her bottom. Her mouth moved along with the words to the song while her heart was racing so fast that she thought it might burst as the song reached its peak.

_I'm just too tired_

_Too tired_

All too soon the pulsing beat ceased and only the lyrics poured through the room. Again, the lyrics overtook her and she slumped her weight against Torn, her head on his shoulder. Her face turned toward his, and he could feel her breath over his neck. It was all he could do to hold her there, in his arms, her body against his, instead of picking her up and taking her somewhere where he could do unspeakable things to her. By the Precursors, he wanted her. It was so unfair that he couldn't ever have her.

_There's just one thing missing_

_One thing missing here is love_

The music picked back up and she turned in his grasp one last time. One hand went to the back of his neck, the other free to sway in the air. His arms went around her as well, and they continued dancing as they had before, with intense look in their eyes, her mouth moving with the words and their hips dipping, swaying, and grinding in unison.

_I like the way you move in the dark_

_I like the tension, the tension and the spark_

_(so pour yourself over me)_

_You know I like the way you move in the dark_

_(so pour yourself over me)_

_You know I like the tension, the tension and, the tension the spark_

_So pour yourself over me (yeah, yeah, yeah)_

_(there's just one thing missing, one thing missing)_

_Until there's nothing left to see (yeah, yeah, yeah)_

_So pour yourself over me_

_(there's just one thing missing, one thing missing)_

_So pour yourself over me_

_(I like the tension, the tension and the spark)_

It may have been the lyrics, it may have been because they were tired for dancing so energetically through the entire song thus far, or it may have been because they had secretly wanted each other for so long a time, but no one in the crowd could possibly miss the intensity coming from both of them. As she had before, she leaned her back against his chest and slid down to the floor, her arms rising to touch along his chest, his legs, anywhere she could reach. When she was back on her feet, she caught a look of something fierce in his eyes, then before either or them could blink he had bent her back in a quick, dizzying dip. The breath being shocked from her lungs, she couldn't resist the strength of his arms as they twirled her and dipped her nearly to the floor again, this time with his body looming over hers. She could clearly see the smirk on his face, and the look in his eyes made fire rush through her veins. He pulled her to her feet, and again he moved before she could react. This time he was descending to the floor, touching her bare skin as he went. Her entire body tingled at his touch, and her eyes followed him, fully enjoying the new angle. Catching her swaying hips, he turned her to face the other way, but her eyes still clung to him over her shoulder. Torn slowly rose to his feet, brushing the front of his body against the back of hers in some sort of sensual torture. For someone who had never really danced before, he was damned good at it.

But Keira was never one to be outdone. She felt the end of the song nearing, and knew just the finishing touch she needed. As Torn loomed over her smaller body, she could feel his breath on her neck. Quickly, she turned in his grasp and, to his and everyone else's surprise, wrapped her legs around his waist. With her hands at his neck and shoulders, she allowed him to dip her once more. The music was slowing and she knew that when he lifted her it would come exactly on the last beat. What she didn't count on was that his mouth would be angled directly over her chest. She could feel his heavy breath flow over her chest, and it absolutely stole the air from her lungs.

_One thing missing here is love_

Torn slowly pulled her torso upright, but she was so breathless that when their faces met nose to nose, she could barely choke out the last word of the song. Her head was spinning, her heart was pounding, and her whole body felt like it was on fire, and she knew that he felt the same. She could tell it in the way he held her to him and hesitated in lowering her to the floor. When he did, their gazes were still locked, their chests still heaving. The lasting notes of the song were ebbing away into the silence, but neither of them noticed.

Kiera had to take a shaky breath before she was able to speak. "Torn…" It was all she could say, but for him, it was the only thing she needed to say.

His lips came crashing down on hers just as his hands came up to frame her face. She kissed him back eagerly, her own hands coming up to circle his neck, to pull them closer as well to just touch him somewhere so that she knew that his was actually reality. At the moment, she didn't care if this was real. She only wanted it never to end. His kiss, his lips, his taste were all exactly like she remembered. Why had she not done this sooner?

He licked her lower lip in a silent request, and she parted her lips for him to deepen the kiss. His tongue darted against hers teasingly and then receded, only to return to explore the depths of her gorgeous mouth. She felt, tasted, and kissed exactly as he had remembered, a mix of pliancy and aggression that was incredibly irresistible. Still, with dancing and the emotions that were battling within him, he was more than breathless and had to pull back for air.

Before another thought could pass through either of their minds, overpowering cheers, whistles, hoops, and hollers roared through the club along with a grand applause. Wide-eyed, Keira and Torn realized for the first time that a crowd had formed around them and that their dance, as well as their kiss, had held the utmost attention of everyone in the club. Keira's eyes roamed over the mix of shocked and gleeful faces. Even the door was open and Bruno was happily clapping along with the rest of the crowd. Finally, her gaze sat on Jak and Ashelin, standing side by side on the inside of the gathered multitude of party-goers. She didn't care about their unreadable expressions or whatever their opinions might be, but it was their mere presence, the fact that most of Haven and Spargus had witnessed her shameless display, that had her pushing past Torn and through several people she didn't care to know and into the restrooms.

* * *

Minutes later, Torn slowly pushed open the door to the women's bathroom. Before him stood another door and to his left was a room shrouded in darkness. Behind the door ahead, he could hear the giggles and hushed voices a several girls. He could only imagine what they were talking about.

"They're laughing at me in there," a muffled voice from the dark room said.

"Keira?" he asked as he stepped into the darkness and waited for his eyes to adjust. Finally, he could see Keira curled up on the lush sofa against the far wall ahead of him. Along the wall he saw that there were several other sofas and benches lining the walls of the room. Then he eyes settled once again on Keira. She was subtly wiping at her face and pretending like nothing was wrong, just as she always did. It scared him to death to let go of his stoic façade for a moment, but he did just that as he knelt in front of her and wiped the tears she had missed from her face. "You're not the one who they're laughing at. I'm the one who made a total ass of myself out there," he said.

She sighed heavily, miserably. "The whole thing was a mistake. It's all my fault."

"Not everything is your fault, Keira," he said and stood, his hand held out for her to take. "Now come on. I'll take you home."

"I'd rather just wait here until everyone left. I can't go out there again."

His hand was still outstretched for her to take. "We'll go out the back way, out the shipping route. We'll get a taxi and no one will known we've gone."

As Keira slowly took his hand and stood beside him, she could have sworn that he smiled, but in the darkness there was no way to tell for sure. "My stuff is still behind the bar," she informed.

"I had Cutter put your things in the back room. We can pick it up on the way out," he replied and began to lead her from the room. Keira looked up at him and something inside her shifted. He had fixed everything, thought of everything, so that all she had to do was walk out the door with him. She had never known him to be so thoughtful, and she had to fight back the urge to hug him.

Using speed he usually reserved only for the battlefield, Torn opened the outside door of the women's restroom and quickly crossed the walkway to the door in front of them marked 'Employees Only'. He was fairly sure that no one had seen them in their rush.

They now stood in the Naughty Ottsel's storage room, mostly filled with freezers and racks used for storing drinks, but for those who knew where to look, there were also several places for backup ammunition and weapons should they ever be needed. Keira's things were gathered on top of a crate that was sitting to the side of the first freezer. Torn, without missing a beat, quickly grabbed the things and continued to lead Keira out onto the street. He was so focused on what he was doing that he almost didn't let her go when she tried to stop and was pulling on his arm.

"Wait just a minute!" she yelled and twisted her wrist out of his hold. "Geez! Are you _trying_ to rip my arm off?" she asked and started searching through the freezer they had just passed.

"What are you doing?"

She emerged from the freezer and closed the door with a clear frosted bottle containing a blue liquid in one hand. "I'm sure Dax won't mind if I take just this one bottle," she said smiling and walked past him.

He quickly caught up, but didn't stop her. "You're already drunk."

"I am not drunk!" she exclaimed indignantly. "I could still kick your ass."

They were out of the building now, making their way up the slight incline that would lead to the street. Once there, they weaved through the massive number of zoomers parked there. The valets had obviously been using the dead end as the parking lot. Torn hailed a taxi once they were clear of other zoomers. It wasn't difficult at all to find a vacant taxi, seeing as how they were swarming the street in front of the Ottsel, knowing several people throughout the night would need a coherent driver.

The silence was an awkward one on their ride back to Freedom League Headquarters in Main Town. They sat on opposite sides of the back seat, both looking out at their doorless side of the zoomer and watching as the brightening sky illuminate the city. Keira was absently chewing on her nails while Torn's fingers made a steady rhythm on his leg.

"I didn't mean to be so much trouble," Keira said quietly as the taxi wound its way through the Industrial section.

"You weren't any trouble," he replied simply. The stoic side of Torn was back, or so it seemed.

"You don't call that trouble? Do you realize how much crap we're going to have to put up with tomorrow?"

"I don't give a damn about what anyone else thinks, Keira. You know that," he shot back.

"I know, but… I wanted to apologize anyways," she replied in a quieter tone of voice.

"Apologize? Do you regret it?' For the first time since they had gotten into the cab, he looked at her troubled expression.

"Of course I regret it!" she shouted, only half lying. The words were like knives in his skin and she could see the way he cringed slightly. "Don't you?"

He hesitated before answering. "No. Given another chance, I think the only thing I would have changed was when I stopped kissing you."

Her eyes went wide, but she quickly recovered, and huffed. "This is insane. We can't do this. We work together."

"What difference does that make? What difference does anything make? Nothing changes the fact that we're attracted to each other," he said, realizing he had just made a serious understatement.

"But that's all it is, Torn. An attraction. That attraction is what made us dance, made us want… made us kiss. I like you, Torn. I like our relationship, our friendship. I don't want to lose you like I lost Jak," she explained.

Torn felt the rumble of a growl in his throat again. "Jak was, and still is, an idiot for letting you go. Whether or not Ashelin was there, he shouldn't have done what he did to you. And I never should have pushed her away."

"What do you mean, 'pushed her away'?" Keira asked.

Now he had said too much. He squirmed a bit in his seat before answering. "It's nothing. Forget I said anything." Yet instead of agreeing to let the matter go, she sat there with her eyes on him, waiting impatiently for him to explain. He sighed and decided there was no use in keeping it to himself any longer. "I fell out of love with Ashelin a long time ago. I stayed with her… well, I don't know why I stayed with her. Maybe because I knew that she'd stay away from Jak if I did. Then after a while, I just started isolating myself from her. I practically threw her at Jak. And I'm the one who's to blame for your breakup."

There was a moment of silence between the two of them. He couldn't look at her, couldn't bear to see the look of disgust he knew would be there. Then, as if out of nowhere, Keira's bubbly laughter poured through the cab. She was laughing at him! At his horrid expression, she tried to stifle her giggles, but it took her a few moments to do so. "Torn, you did no such thing," she explained, a smile still on her face.

"Jak and I just had a falling out about his abandonment issues. I expected him to sympathize with me or even worry about me when I wasn't there to help him in the Wasteland. He wouldn't listen when I tried to explain that Errol had kidnapped me and was holding me prisoner. I thought he of all people would know how horrible it was for me. But he felt like I had betrayed him, and there was nothing I could do to change his mind. You saw how he practically shoved me off of him when he came back." She paused, her eyes on something that was all of a sudden interesting about her fingernails. Her teeth tugged on her lip as if she was contemplating whether or not to continue. The taxi was entering Main Town, and she knew that if she didn't say what she had to say now, she might not ever say it.

"I know you shirked your duties to come looking for me, that you risked your life to sneak your way through the KG Factory to find me. You were there for me when no one else was. I might not have made it out of there if it weren't for you, and I don't think I ever thanked you."

"There's no need to thank me. You would have found your way out of there eventually. I didn't see much point in fighting a war when my best soldier was missing. It would have been a lost cause. The League needed you back." He paused, running a hand through his short hair. "_I_ needed you back," he muttered to himself.

But she heard him all the same, and it brought her back to her argument. "We can't act on this attraction that we seem to have, Torn. It's unprofessional. We won't be able to work together as we should." She was visibly uncomfortable, pulling at her skirt while she crossed and uncrossed her legs.

Freedom League Headquarters was coming up into view. The taxi slowed and switched hover zones to allow them to get out, but neither of them moved. Something was agitating Torn, and Keira dared not move until he did.

"Is that all you think this is?" he finally asked, a hard edge to the lines of his face. "Just some petty attraction between two lonely people?" He pulled himself out of the cab with a hard jolt that sent the zoomer swaying even with the weight of two other people to weigh it down.

Quickly, Keira gathered her things and shortly thanked the driver before running after him, a difficult feat with her feet still in heels. "I don't understand," she called from behind him. "You don't mean… how could you not hate me?"

Torn slammed his hand over the call button for the elevator and turned to her. "What the hell are you talking about? What reason do I have to hate you or even be angry with you other than the fact that you're the most stubborn woman I've ever met?"

She let that comment slide and tried to stick to what she was trying to say. "Because… because I…"

"Because you think you killed my parents?" he ground out and glanced at the opening elevator doors. He stepped onto the platform and held the door as he waited for her to follow. Once the doors were closed, he pressed the command for the sixth floor and turned to her again. "You need to let it go, Keira. I felt the same way you did for a while. Then I realized that it didn't matter if we had been there when the metal heads attacked. Baron Praxis killed the whole town. He's the one who let down the shield, and he's the one who pulled the Guard back and left everyone to die. If we had been there, we would have died along with everyone else."

He advanced on her, crowding her until she had no choice but to stand her ground. "Answer my question. Do you think this is just some petty attraction? Is that how you feel? Because that's not what it seemed like to me when we kissed."

"I can't do this," she said and she fled into the hallway and toward her room as the doors opened behind her. Just as her door was sliding open, his hand slammed against the command panel and shut it back. She stood staring at the door with blank eyes, not able to turn to look at him. His body crowded hers, and she could feel his breath on her as his mouth moved to the back of her ear.

"Tell me that you don't love me," she said low into her ear, his deep, raspy voice making her weak in the knees. "If you can honestly tell me that you don't love me, I'll leave you alone and never bring this up again. But know that two and a half years ago, I fell in love with a woman that I knew I could spend the rest of my life with. She stole a part of me that I can't get back, and yet I don't seem to have that part of her. Now… tell me that you don't love me."

He waited for her to say something, to move, to do anything, but she stood still as if in shock, as if she wanted to say something she couldn't bring herself to say. Silence stretched between them, and Torn decided that silence was the same as her not wanting to admit what she felt. Without a word, he pushed off from the door and started to stride to his own room. As his hand flattened on the control panel when he heard a thunk in Keira's direction. From the corner of his eye, he knew that she was leaning her forehead on her door. He waited only one more second before opening his door.

"You're wrong."

He paused in his doorway, looking her way to see her coat fall to the floor, her bag and bottle of liquor making soft thumps as they landed in the crumpled coat.

"What exactly am I wrong about?" he asked impatiently, wanting nothing more that to finish the half empty bottle of scotch he had in the kitchen cabinet, fall asleep, and wake up to pretend this whole night had never happened.

She pushed herself away from her door and somehow found the courage to walk the few steps that it took to stand in front of him. With her determination setting in, she looked up at him and smiled. "You were wrong about my heart," she said. "You stole it away from me little by little, and by the time I realized it was gone, I couldn't get it back. Damn it all, Torn, I love you too."

Without hesitation, she pulled him to her by the front of his shirt and kissed him with all the pent up emotion that had been building up inside her for far too long. He kissed her back, his arms wrapping around her to pull her closer. When their lips parted, he picked her up so that she had no choice but to wrap her legs around his waist to keep from falling. Keira giggled that sweet, bubbly laugh that he loved and they smiled at each other as he carried her deeper into his room.

Suddenly, she straightened her features and tried and horribly failed to make a serious face. "Torn, I swear by the Precursors that if you break my heart, I'll kick your ass."

"If I'm ever stupid enough to do something like that, I'd certainly let you."

She huffed indignantly with her hands on her hips. "Let me? Are you saying that you have to not fight back for me to take you down?"

He silenced her with another lingering kiss. "That's not was I was saying at all, Keira. Not at all."

* * *

- Author's Note -

Gah! I'm finally done with this monster of a one-shot. I really did not plan for it to go on this long. Well… I hope it wasn't so long that it seemed repetitive beyond the point of being boring. I hope I didn't confuse anyone with some of the things that were going on. I haven't written any of the things that they've talked about, but hopefully I went over them briefly enough for you to not be completely lost. So, what did you think? I really hope it wasn't too cheesy. I tried to make it somewhat fathomable. This whole thing came to me when I started listening to Darren Hayes's new album, but I thought the dancing really didn't fit in with the tone of the fanfic it would go in. I hope you enjoyed it nonetheless. Please read and review! -JATS


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